Eating Cat For Dinner (Red Eye) -- Italian TV chef upsets viewers with casserole recipe

Whole Foods On the Side of Sanity!

What I find funny is that these tie-died Libs shop at a non-union store and they often wonder why the employees are happier and more friendly/helpful that their [union] counterparts. Start shopping at Ralph’s or Vons and you will soon be back!

Health Care Stirs Up Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, Customers Boycott Organic Grocery Store Branding Experts Say CEOs Should Stay Quiet When It Comes to Politics By EMILY FRIEDMAN Aug. 14, 2009

Joshua has been taking the bus to his local Whole Foods in New York City every five days for the past two years. This week, he said he'll go elsewhere to fulfill his fresh vegetable and organic produce needs.

"I will never shop there again," vowed Joshua, a 45-year-old blogger, who asked that his last name not be published.

Like many of his fellow health food fanatics, Joshua said he will no longer patronize the store after learning about Whole Foods Market Inc.'s CEO John Mackey's views on health care reform, which were made public this week in an op-ed piece he wrote for The Wall Street Journal.

Michael Lent, another Whole Foods enthusiast in Long Beach, Calif., told ABCNews.com that he, too, will turn to other organic groceries for his weekly shopping list.

"I'm boycotting [Whole Foods] because all Americans need health care," said Lent, 33, who used to visit his local Whole Foods "several times a week."

"While Mackey is worried about health care and stimulus spending, he doesn't seem too worried about expensive wars and tax breaks for the wealthy and big businesses such as his own that contribute to the deficit," said Lent.

In his op-ed, "The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare," published Tuesday, Mackey criticized President Barack Obama's health care plan.

Mackey provided eight "reforms" he argued the U.S. can do to improve health care
without increasing the deficit. He suggested that tax forms be revised to "make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance."

Mackey also called for a move toward "less government control and more individual empowerment" instead of "a massive new health care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits."

He added that many of the country's health care problems are "self-inflicted" and are preventable through "proper diet, exercise, not smoking, minimal alcohol consumption and other healthy lifestyle choices."

In the op-ed, Mackey outlines Whole Foods' employee health insurance policy. According to Mackey, Whole Foods pays 100 percent of the premiums for all employees who work 30 hours or more per week -- about 89 percent of his workforce.

Additionally, the company gives each employee $1,800 per year in "health-care dollars," says Mackey, that they can use at their own discretion for health and wellness expenses. This money can be put toward the $2,500 annual deductible that must be covered before Mackey says the company's "insurance plan kicks in."

Whole Foods Shoppers Weigh In

The op-ed piece, which begins with a Margaret Thatcher quote, "The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money," has left some Whole Foods loyalists enraged. Many say Mackey was out of line to opine against the liberal base that has made his fortune possible.

Christine Taylor, a 34-year-old New Jersey shopper, vowed never to step foot in another Whole Foods again.

"I will no longer be shopping at Whole Foods," Taylor told ABCNews.com. "I think a CEO should take care that if he speaks about politics, that his beliefs reflect at least the majority of his clients."

Countless Whole Foods shoppers have taken their gripes with Mackey's op-ed to the Internet, where people on the social networking sites Twitter and Facebook are calling for a boycott of the store.

A commenter on the Whole Foods forum, identified only by his handle, "PracticePreach," wrote, "It is an absolute slap in the face to the millions of progressive-minded consumers that have made [Whole Foods] what it is today."

"You should know who butters your hearth-baked bread, John," wrote the commenter. "Last time I checked it wasn't the insurance industry conservatives who made you a millionaire a hundred times over.".....

Our St. Patty’s Day Experience

St. Patty’s Day is a holiday my wife, friends, and I enjoy celebrating every year - as we are Irish. There is a new Bristol Farms in town and we were walking through the store checking them out, we ended up trying the corn beef they offered as a sample and way to get customers to buy the prepared meals for the Irish holiday. We were sold! We ended up preordering eight meals for our family and some neighbors. When the day came (17th) we went to pick up the meals, they pointed out that there were reheating instructions included (See below).

When we got home and started to take out the containers, we noticed they were plastic and not aluminum, as the instructions mentioned. So I called Bristol Farms. They mentioned they were old instructions and that they were sufficient for the task. So I asked specifically if we should put the plastic containers in the oven. The response was that we could. I asked if we should still put the aluminum foil on the top, they said yes.

Well, as you can see wherever the aluminum foil touched it melted the plastic, not to mention a general meltdown. Fumes, smoke, smell, all contributed to drive our guests outside our condo. Now, I realize that people make mistakes, and apparently these were not the “oven-safe” containers they thought they were giving us. To be fair, Bristol Farm management was very sympathetic and gave us a full refund of the $90. However, I must say a couple of things.

Firstly, I can better understand this mistake if it were made at Ralph’s, or Vons. However, Bristol Farms bills itself as a step above these other grocery chains. For the money, they had better. Secondly, in these economic times where people are cutting back, these types of higher end businesses need to pull customers in like us and try to make us permanent visitors to their business, and thus benefit by us spending our hard-earned money there. Bristol Farms failed our yearly family celebration (on both accounts), a mistake we will not make again, unfortunately for Bristol Farms.

I think, upon further reflection, my family will stick with Whole Foods.

Papa Giorgio

Beer vs. Wine w/Cheese

K.O.

Stephen Jenkins -- Cheese Expert

Wiggin Out!

Fools for Wine
What Were the Other People Thinking?

When I introduced my friends to some good wines and got them hooked, I should have realized they would take their own flare to wine tours. So here is their own "flare" from their trip to the Paso Robles area:

This is also a good place to re-introduce a conversation I had with an acquaintance. She had let the wine loosen up conversation and she started in on her dislike of the Christian faith, not realizing that what she was saying was easily dealt with and was a commentary more on her innate fear of anything outside her reality.

Defending the Faith Over a Syrah, which I suppose is the best way to defend the faith. Enjoy

Just a word of caution boys... "Please Don't Eat the Daisies," er, I mean "grapes," sometimes they "bite" back: